Halloween Discussion Forums, Costumes, Horror!

I've seen them in various movies, like Solomon Kane, Season of the Witch and other movies.

It's a European Plague Doctor. They wore those masks and glasses to keep from catching the bubonic plague from those they were treating.

Thanks, Pumpkin56!

Anytime. Creepy isn't it? If I was seriously ill, I definitely wouldn't want to be treated by one of these guys!

I was never a fan of history and stuff. I understand the masks, what I dont is the unusual beak like shape. lol.

I'm not sure either. Maybe it helped them breathe easier? Or maybe they just wanted to scare terminal patients even more...

Pumpkin56 wrote:It's a European Plague Doctor. They wore those masks and glasses to keep from catching the bubonic plague from those they were treating.

Spot on!

Very creepy though!

Back when they were used people believed the plague was caused by bad smells. The beak was filled with, I don't know, good smelling stuff, to keep them from catching it. I learned about this from cracked.com.

Rising Dead Man wrote:Back when they were used people believed the plague was caused by bad smells. The beak was filled with, I don't know, good smelling stuff, to keep them from catching it. I learned about this from cracked.com.

Right. That "bad odor" theory persisted well into the 19th century. I guess it made a kind of sense. Some diseases are air-borne, and many fevers and such come from mosquitoes, which breed in smelly, stagnant swamps. Decaying meat and fecal matter are germy and smell bad. So it wasn't a totally cracked idea. They just didn't understand that it wasn't the smell itself causing the disease, but other things which the smell signified or was associated with.

I believe it was an Englishman in the mid-19th century who first proved that cholera was water-borne. He did so by tracing how all the people in a cholera-stricken area of London had gotten their water from the same well. I guess the well was contaminated with sewage.

We owe a great deal to the medical researchers and scientists who pioneered germ theory in the 18th and 19th centuries. We don't study enough about those people.

Murfreesboro wrote:

Rising Dead Man wrote:Back when they were used people believed the plague was caused by bad smells. The beak was filled with, I don't know, good smelling stuff, to keep them from catching it. I learned about this from cracked.com.

Right. That "bad odor" theory persisted well into the 19th century. I guess it made a kind of sense. Some diseases are air-borne, and many fevers and such come from mosquitoes, which breed in smelly, stagnant swamps. Decaying meat and fecal matter are germy and smell bad. So it wasn't a totally cracked idea. They just didn't understand that it wasn't the smell itself causing the disease, but other things which the smell signified or was associated with.

I believe it was an Englishman in the mid-19th century who first proved that cholera was water-borne. He did so by tracing how all the people in a cholera-stricken area of London had gotten their water from the same well. I guess the well was contaminated with sewage.

We owe a great deal to the medical researchers and scientists who pioneered germ theory in the 18th and 19th centuries. We don't study enough about those people.

Thank you, RDM and Murf. Now, the reason for the beak makes perfect sense! I'd be the first one to put something pleasant smellling in that compartment. I have a weak stomach for stenches! I think, I'm going to do some reading on this.

Haha! My husband was a steampunk plague doctor this year!

Plague Doctor masks were typically filled with coal and some pleasant smelling herbs. They did know that charcoal acted as a filter for bad things, which is why they put it in the "beak" of the mask. Also, the lenses in the masks were tinted red. This was done because they thought that evil spirits were inside the plague-infested bodies and the red lenses would prevent them from getting possessed.

Plague doctors also carried "poking sticks"-- which were used to examine plague victims from a distance.

Thanks, jadewik!

Funny I saw tthis thread cause I watch seaon of the witch lsat night with nicolas cage and they are in that movie at the begining when he was taking to a king with the plauge

Does that connect to Halloween 3 Season of Witch?

Li H'Sen Chang wrote:Does that connect to Halloween 3 Season of Witch?

THAT IS THE BEST HALLOWEEN MOVIE SINCE TOM ATKINS IS IN IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

IT DOESN'T HAVE THE EVIL BEARD POWERED MYERS LIKE THE REMAKE AND ITS SEQUEL DO, BUT IT IS STILL AWESOME!!!!!!!!!!!